I must admit, I’m not much of a hockey fan. In fact, I have never seen a live hockey game in my entire 30 years of existence.
I grew up in Oregon where Hockey isn’t really a big deal. I’ve never really had an opportunity to go to a game, nor have I ever been dying to get tickets.
However, my wife got 4 tickets to a San Jose sharks game against another team that had a uniform on as well (for the life of me I can’t who the sharks played). I was happy to hear that we won these tickets because 1: I didn’t pay for them, and 2: I’ve always heard how fun the San Jose sharks are to watch.
With four tickets, we asked a few friends to go with us and catch the game. It was a Monday night, so it wasn’t the best day during the week to stay up late and fully experience the San Jose Sharks without dreading having to show up to work on Tuesday morning in the back of our minds.
Either way, we had a great time. We parked our car just outside the SAP center a few hours before game time and we walked a couple blocks to one of the coolest bars I’ve been to; O’Flaherty’s Irish Pub.
it’s located right on S San Pedro St, just a few blocks South of the SAP center. The beer was awesome, the food was AMAZING and the atmosphere was full of pumped up San Jose Shark fans pregaming for the night.
I could have stayed at the bar and kept eating and drinking the fine local food, but we were in San Jose for hockey, not for dining.
After watching my first hockey game, I must say that it’s a sport unlike any other. You can actually hear the players every movement as their skates hit the ice and as they hit each other. The slap of the puck on every shot hit every wall in the arena. Everything was so alive, and people were having so much fun cheering for their local San Jose team.
The sharks won by a few goals. Every goal was celebrated with loud music and horrible dancing, but everyone was doing it together so it was more fun that way.
I would say that my first hockey game was definitely a success. I’m already wanting to go back for another game, but making it a night out in San Jose as well.
There are a few more places that I would like to pregame at in San Jose before my 2nd hockey game. The Farmers Union sounds like a good time with 4.2 stars out of 5.0 with over 900 Google reviews.
If you have any recommendations of where we should enjoy our next experience in downtown San Jose, please feel free to share in the comments!